Benghazi is the worst scandal in memory, and the compliant media — the PR arm of the Obama campaign — is ready to brush it aside as if it were “just a bump in the road.” the president’s own callous designation for four murdered Americans. The administration story clearly departed from what was known and when it was known. Brett Baier has compiled a timeline of events.

It has been confusing, as the administration tried valiantly to insist that it was a spontaneous mob reaction to a 14 minute YouTube video critical of Islam that apparently no one had seen, which resulted in mob violence and attacks on embassies in 20 countries. The administration knew within 24 hours of the 9/11 attack that it was a planned attack by terrorists. Secretary of State Clinton announced on the 13th that she found the anti-Muslim movie trailer that sparked violent attacks on American embassies across the Middle east “disgusting and reprehensible.” President Obama said there were going to be “a few bumps in the road,” and headed off to Las Vegas for a fundraiser.

Nakoula Basili Nakoula who made the You Tube video was ‘coincidentally’ picked up on the 13th for questioning about a probation violation of using a computer. He was judged a “flight risk” and sentenced to solitary confinement for at least a couple of weeks.

To push the video story on September 16, UN Ambassador Susan Rice was dispatched to the Sunday shows, where she obediently, 5 days after the attack said it was a spontaneous uprising in reaction to the video

“We had a substantial security presence with our personnel and the consulate in Benghazi. Tragically, two of the four Americans who were killed were there providing security. That was their function. And indeed, there were many other colleagues who were doing the same with them.”

That wasn’t true either. The “consulate” was an unsecured building, the Libyan security ran away, and the two former SEALS were not there to protect the ambassador or the facility, but lost their lives when they stepped forward to try to help.

So a week after the attack Obama and his administration were still trying to push the video story. Or to rephrase it — they have been deliberately lying to the American public. And eventually they gave up that story and started lying about lying about it.

Mr. Obama has had a great deal invested in his brag about killing bin Laden, and decimating the bin Laden terrorist group. After considerable (a year) hesitation, he agreed to the raid, which any president would have done. The organization is still alive and well.

For clarification I turned to the DiploMad, a former State Department official who reported from Banda Aceh on the 2004 Indonesian tsunami rescue efforts. He said:

The attack on the US facility in Benghazi is a scandal of–literally–murderous proportions. The lack of concern for even basic security procedures, the mishandling of intelligence information, the willful blindness towards the causes of the attack, and the outrageous and outright lying to cover up the incompetence by Carney, Rice, Clinton, Obama, and now Clapper is breath-taking.

The late Ambassador Stevens, I am sorry to say, has a share of the blame for the failure to use common sense and to behave in a manner that would have protected him and his people. This failure cost him his life and those of three other Americans, and apparently produced a catastrophe for US interests.

I will be criticized for criticizing a murdered Ambassador, but he was the man in charge. His greatest apparent shortcoming, and I would gladly retract this and apologize if the evidence points elsewhere, was allowing that facility, which apparently played a key role in our intel efforts in the region, to operate with nothing that approximated even basic security standards. In addition, he drew attention to the facility by announcing that he would go to Benghazi, and that he would inaugurate an “American Corner” there. He did this although, apparently, he had concerns about the security of the facility in Benghazi, as well as his own safety,

Read the whole thing. It strikes me as straightforward common sense from someone who knows the ropes.

This is a cover-up, a deliberate attempt to hide the truth by an administration that claimed it wanted to be the most transparent in history. It involves the murder of four Americans, one our ambassador, and involves our national security. The attack on the Benghazi safe-house indicates that it was well known to the terrorists, and more than 15 days later the FBI has not been to Benghazi to secure the premises. What documents were taken is still unknown. Why was there an unsecured ‘consulate’ in the first place. We’ve learned that the Administration actually deleted damning State Department memos from the Internet, in which State expressed the view that it had “no credible information to suggest that al-Qaeda or any terrorist group is plotting any kind of attack overseas to coincide with the upcoming anniversary of September 11.”

Congressional Democrats have actually demanded some detailed information. Obama is still out on the campaign trail. Appearances on Letterman, and shamefully on the View were fine, but the President was too busy to meet with Prime Minister Netanyahu. This seems to be just another occasion where Obama’s self-concern is larger than the national interest. It is still all about him.